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Devin Townsend Project
The Devin Townsend Project (2008–present) After removing himself from the music industry, Townsend cut his trademark hair off[44] and gave up drinking and smoking.[45] Townsend found it "disconcerting" that he had difficulty writing music without drugs, and that he had trouble identifying his purpose as a musician. He spent a year producing albums in absence of writing, but found it unrewarding and decided to "pick up the guitar and just write".[44] This began a period of "self discovery"[45] where he learned "how to create without drugs".[46] Over two years, Townsend wrote over 60 songs, and found that they fit into "four distinct styles".[44] In March 2009, Townsend announced his plans for a four-album series called The Devin Townsend Project,[46] with the goal of clarifying his musical identity and being "accountable" for the persona he projects to the public.[44] The project's concept includes a different "theme" and a different group of musicians on each album.[46] Ki, the first album of The Devin Townsend Project, was written to "set the stage" for the subsequent albums.[46] Townsend channeled his newfound control and sobriety into Ki, a "tense, quiet" album that contrasts with much of the music he had been known for.[44] Ki was released in May 2009.[47] The second entry, a "commercial, yet heavy" album called Addicted, was released in November 2009. Townsend returned to the stage in January 2010, touring North America with headliner Between the Buried and Me as well as Cynic and Scale the Summit. This was followed by a headlining tour in Australia and a series of high-profile shows in Europe (for example co-headlining the Brutal Assault festival in Czech Republic). He headlined a North American tour with UK label mates TesseracT supporting, which began in October 2010, and toured in Europe with support from Aeon Zen and Anneke van Giersbergen.[48] The final albums in The Devin Townsend Project series, Deconstruction and Ghost were released on June 21, 2011. Townsend is to perform all four of The Devin Townsend Project albums in the UK and record them for release in a special DVD to coincide with the release of The Devin Townsend Project boxset. The first two shows have been confirmed to be held at Union Chapel in Islington on November 10 and November 13 where he will be playing the albums Ki and Ghost respectively. These four shows will each be entitled "An Evening With The Devin Townsend Project".[49] Since 2009, Townsend has discussed plans to expand the Ziltoid the Omniscient franchise. His ideas included a sequel album, a "full blown musical" with the title Z2,[50] but the album appeared to have been scrapped, as Townsend stated in mid-June 2011, "I’m very rapidly realizing that humor and metal… it doesn’t really work." However, as of July 2011, he has stated on his Twitter account that the album was still in the works, but was "vying for pole-position" as he works on other projects.[51] He has expressed possible plans to begin a series of online videos, a series titled ZTV, instead, in which a Ziltoid hand puppet conducts interviews with various bands.[52] A graphic novel based on the Ziltoid character, and possibly performing the Ziltoid album as a staged musical, at least as a one-off, have also been considered.[53] Townsend has stated on his Twitter that he is working on a new album, entitled "Epicloud". He described the album as "Big, heavy, romantic kind of melodic stuff. Pretty, ethereal and simple." [54]